Moogfest 2016 unveiled an ambitious daytime lineup of events that features many musical artists, including Laurie Anderson, GZA, and Daniel Lanois,
leading master classes, workshops, and conversations that explore the
technologies, innovations, and ideas that make the festival’s
cutting-edge evening performances possible.
To celebrate the legacy of Bob
Moog, an engineer who worked in partnership with artists to invent new
creative tools, Moogfest reimagines the tech conference and music
festival by taking the best of both formats to create a completely new
type of experience. Hailed as “a sci-fi dance party with a Ph.D. in STEM” by The New York Times, Moogfest 2016 will gather more than 250 technologists, musicians, and artists – from Grimes and Gary Numan to Jaron Lanier and Dr. Martine Rothblatt
– to explore new technologies that are pushing the boundaries of
creative expression. For the first time, Moogfest will take place in
Durham, North Carolina, named one the hottest cities for tech in 2016 by Business Insider, and just a few hours from the employee-owned Moog Music factory in Asheville.
Reflecting its role as an incubator for experimentation across technology, art, and music, Moogfest enlisted The Haxan Cloak and Smashing Boxes, a Durham-based digital design firm, to collaborate on turning the Moogfest website into instrument. Dubbed “_substrate”,
it allows fans to manipulate individual audio tracks by swiping,
tapping, and clicking the screen, resulting in a totally unique audio
and 3D visual experience for each user. The experience launches with a
remix by The Haxan Cloak (Moses Sumney’s cover of Laurie Anderson’s “O
Superman”), and will expand in the coming months to feature other
Moogfest artists.
Watch the tutorial on how to use _substrate HERE.
Tickets for Moogfest 2016 are available for $249 (Festival Pass) and $499 (VIP Pass) at www.moogfest.com. Exact times, dates, and locations of all daytime events will be announced today.
The Moogfest Day-to-Night Journey
Evening headliners will participate in a
range of daytime programs including master classes that take audiences
deep inside the artist’s creative process, workshops, conversations,
film screenings, and improvisational performances. Highlights include:
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Musical experimentalist Laurie Anderson will be interviewed by Jana Hunter of Lower Dens.
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GZA will discuss Time Traveling with Hip Hop in a conversation moderated by Duke University Professor of Black Popular Culture, Mark Anthony Neal.
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Master Classes will be led by legendary producer and musician Daniel Lanois (U2, Peter Gabriel), ambient house pioneers The Orb, and composer and producer Ben Frost with drone trailblazer Tim Hecker. The Orb will also host a screening of their film, Lunar Orbit. It will be the only screening with The Orb in attendance and in conversation.
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Reggie Watts, Tyondai Braxton, Mykki Blanco will discuss Afrofuturism,
which combines elements of science fiction, astral jazz, historical
fiction, psychedelic hip hop, fantasy, and magic realism in order to
critique not only the present-day dilemmas but also to re-examine the
historical events of the past. -
Odesza will take apart one of the their songs, and piece by piece, tell the story of how it was made in a live recording of Song Exploder, the hit podcast hosted by Hirishikesh Hirway.
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Claire Evans of YACHT will
present The Future is Unmanned, a condensed feminist history of the
Internet, tracing the role of women from the human computers of the 19th
century to the cyberfeminists who made videogames, hypertext novels,
virtual reality projects, and non-narrative art pieces on websites and
CD-ROMs before disappearing along with the bursting of the dot-com
bubble. -
Julia Holter and Empress Of will participate in live episodes of the No Effects podcast hosted by Jesse Cohen of Tanlines.
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Mad Professor will host a Workshop on the History and Future of Dub and also join with Ras Kush, Tippy and Lister
for Reggae Hacker Soundsystem, a conversation exploring the evolution
of dub and home-made sound system culture, radiating outwards from its
native Jamaica. -
Pioneering synthesist Suzanne Ciani will perform in a four-hour-long experimental session with immersive visuals as part of the Durational series.
Conversations
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The Future of Our Species
Cyborg artist Neil Harbisson joins Pau Riba, BJ Murphy, Rich Lee, and Daniel Lock
to discuss how humans are taking an active part in their own biological
evolution. By becoming technology, instead of using or wearing
technology, humans are opening up the possibility of having additional
organs and senses beyond the ones confined to our species. -
Creating Music Tech with Kickstarter
Nick Yulman, curator of Kickstarter’s
Design and Technology categories, will share some innovative music tech
projects that have come to life with the help of the platform’s
community, which allows instrument creators to test ideas and get
feedback from music makers as part of an open development process. -
“Technoshamanism: A Very Psychedelic Century!”
Paleo-ecologist turned multimedia performer Michael Garfield
will take festival-goers on a playful, deep discussion on the new
technologies that are dissolving boundary between the “made” and “born,”
the “natural” and “artificial.” – and how the indigenous medicine
traditions are just what are required to navigate this brave new digital
society. -
“Hyperinstruments: Opera of the Future Tod Machover (MIT Media Lab)”
Composer/inventor Tod Machover will describe the past, present and
(potential) future of his Opera of the Future group at the MIT Media
Lab, showing Hyperinstruments for soloists and ensembles, responsive
stage technologies that go beyond multimedia, large-scale collaborative
systems that enable entire cities to create symphonies together, and
musical tools and concepts that promote wellbeing, diagnose disease, and
customize compositions to individual needs and desires. -
Synth Instrument Pioneers
Explore the art of musical instrument design with some of the
synthesizer industry’s most influential analog architects; past, present
and future. This year’s featured luminaries are David Friend, co-founder of ARP; Tatsuya Takahashi, Korg’s Chief Engineer of Analog Synth Development; David Van Koevering, inventor of the Van Koevering Piano; and Cyril Lance, Chief Engineer of Moog Music.
Workshops
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Virtual Reality Prototyping with North Carolina State University
NCSU’s Derek Ham and Helen Armstrong will lead a hands-on workshop on
Virtual Reality where participants will prototype content using a simple
physical kit and then experience their designs in 3D using an Oculus
Rift. -
Sonifying Data with Gray Area
Participants will break past the limits of the eye and explore
alternative methods of visualizing data to discover other methods of
perception that can be used to enhance and augment our ability to
present data. -
Video Synthesis + Collaboration with Undervolt & Co
Undervolt & Co., the independent online artist-run distributor of
time-based art, leads a collaborative video-making workshop providing
participants with the opportunity to learn the basics of modular analog
video synthesizers in a creative play space. -
Interspecies Collaboration with Data Garden
Participants will be invited to explore music generated from plants’
communication with virtual synths and sample based environments while
Data Garden artists share new software they’re developing to produce
bio-generated digital art. -
Hypnotique Sceance
The Church of Space in association with Poèmes Électroniques, will
guide participants to explore modern magic theory, based on the latest
research in brain science and quantum mechanics, by entering a mild
state of trance via audio and visual stimulation. -
Music In The Brain’ with Duke Institute for Brain Sciences
Explore the effects of music on brain structure and function in this
workshop that will highlight the intersection between artistic and
scientific perspectives on this fundamental and aesthetic form of human
expression.
Film Fest
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“Future Projections: Memories of the Space Age”
Future Projections is a 9-part screening program of short film and
video work drawn from 125 years of techno-prophecy and oracular
future-visions. Curated by Ben Russell, including Adam Beckett, Barbara
Hammer, Beatrice Gibson, Ben Rivers, Cauleen Smith, Chris Marker,
Deborah Stratman, Fernand Léger, Harun Farocki, JJ Murphy, Jesse McLean,
Louis Henderson, Making Takashi, Michael Robinson, Mike Stoltz,
OJOBOCA, Peter Burr, Rachel Rose, Rosa Barba, Rose Lowder, Sara
Magenheimer, Scott Bartlett, Shambhavi Kaul, Shirley Clarke, Tony
Conrad, Yuri Ancarani -
“The Three Grace(s) triptych” Screening and live score by ADULT
Detroit electronic duo ADULT will be presenting a unique presentation
of original film and live soundtrack performance. The Three Grace(s)
triptych chronicles the two year affair of artists/musicians Nicola
Kuperus & Adam Lee Miller. -
“Crocodile Gennadiy” Screening and Q&A
The documentary, featuring a score by The Haxan Cloak and Academy
Award-winner Atticus Ross (The Social Network), will be screened and
followed by a conversation with The Haxan Cloak and musician Leopold
Ross. -
“The Silence”/”Gagglebox”/”Zombies 1985” Screening with Live Score by I Speak Machine
I Speak Machine (vocalist and synth-nerd Tara Busch and filmmaker Maf
Lewis) create brooding soundtracks for horror/sci-fi films. Busch will
play the score live, on vocals and an array of analog synths. -
“It Follows” Screening and Q&A with composer Disasterpeace
The acclaimed horror film “It Follows” took the 2014 Cannes Film
Festival by storm and went on to exceed all expectations at the box
office in 2015. Following the screening, Disasterpeace, the composer of
the film, will discuss the background and inner workings of the score.
Moogfest is the synthesis of
music, art, and technology. Since 2004, Moogfest has brought together
artists, futurist thinkers, inventors, entrepreneurs, designers,
engineers, scientists, and musicians. By day, Moogfest is a platform for
conversation and experimentation. By night, Moogfest presents
cutting-edge music in venues throughout the city. This mind-expanding
conference attracts creative and technology enthusiasts for three days
of participatory programming in Durham, North Carolina. Performing
artists include early pioneers in electronic music, alongside pop and
avant-garde experimentalists of today.
MOOGFEST:
Festival Pass $249
General Admission for the duration of the event, May 19-22. Access to
all festival venues for performances and conference programming:
conversations, workshops, and installations.
VIP Festival Pass $499
VIP access for the duration of the event, May 19-22. *Priority access to
all festival venues for performances and conference programming:
conversations, workshops, and installations. Access to exclusive VIP
viewing areas and VIP/artist events. Gift bag. Complimentary food and
drink in select locations. Special merch deals. More perks to be
announced.
*Subject to capacity and based on first come first served
Engineer VIP $1,000 – SOLD OUT!
This two-day synth-building workshop, led by Moog engineers, invites a
select group of enthusiasts to build their very own unreleased Moog
analog synthesizer and sequencer. The hands-on workshop is conducted in
two, three-hour sessions within a pop-up Moog production facility. No
experience necessary, but basic soldering knowledge is recommended.
Participants in the Engineering workshop also have VIP access for the
duration of the event, May 19-22. *Priority access to all festival
venues for performances and conference programming: conversations,
workshops, and installations. Access to exclusive VIP viewing areas and
VIP/artist events. Gift bag. Complimentary food and drink in select
locations. Passes available for pick-up at your hotel. Special merch
deals. More perks to be announced. *Subject to capacity and based on
first come first served.
All prices exclusive of applicable fees.
